Giving Instructions...

My chosen category: 

• Making a cup of tea. 

Such a basic thing, that we all do a number of times throughout the day no doubt...But how did we know how to do it in the first place? 

I started by consulting with a well know tea brand 'Yorkshire Tea'. They broke down their tea making instructions into 5 steps: 

1. Treat your water kindly. 

"Run the tap a little so the water's nicely aerated, and only boil it once to keep the oxygen level up. Oxygen in water helps flavour!"

2. Keep everything toasty. 

"Tea likes hot water, but a chilly teapot cools things down - so swirl a little boiling water around the empty pot first. For bonus points, use that water to warm the cups too". 


3. Add tea and water. 

"Add 2 tea bags to a regular teapot or one tea bag to a mini teapot. If you're using loose tea, add one teaspoon per person and one for the pot. Pour the hot water in and stir a bit." 

4. Wait patiently. 

"Tea needs time to unlock all its flavour, so give it 4-5 minutes to do its thing. This is a perfect time to munch a sneaky biscuit or daydream about holidays".


5. Customise your brew. 

"We like a splash of semi skimmed or whole milk, but your brew is unique to you - so add milk, sugar, honey, lemon or nothing at all. Most importantly, enjoy!"

Yorkshire Tea has helped enormously. I love the casual and relaxed language that they use in their instructions. There graphics are fun, with movement. Hand drawn in style which I really like. 

I then went through the list of their instructions again, and cut it down to the necessary points. I want to keep my instructions as basic and simple as possible: 

When looking for reference material, I searched for instructions in a number of areas, medical, cooking, washing. Each piece is simple and easy to follow. The more effective instructions so have illustrations helping to direct the reader. 

Examples of reference: 

Now for inspiration! 

Mood Board: This style of illustration caught my eye initially, stylish black ink in style, very sophisticated. 

Mood Board: In complete contrast, I also love the vintage feel of tea. It is a classic, British drink.The delicate colours here are so appealing, pretty.  

Out of the two ideas, I was more drawn to the presentation of the vintage set. 

Thumbnails: 

I played with the idea of creating a strip of instructions and also including all squares in one. I particularly like all images in the same square. 

I decided to guide the eye from the top left of the square down to the bottom left with the step by step images. 

• I also wanted to show 'boiling' from the kettle, so add steam into the sketch. 
• I also wanted to add a stop watch to suggest brewing time. 
• The teacup in the 3rd thumbnail will be slightly bigger in scale to the teapot in the other thumbnails, this is to emphasise its importance. 

To work at a larger scale as the exercise suggests, I will work on A3. 

Vintage teapot inspiration:

I have this beautiful tea pot so I took a close look, especially the shape and intricate detailing. I feel that the entire floral design would be too distracting considering the brief, the instruction element should be the main focus. I also decided through looking through images that if I am to go for a vintage feel, a stove style kettle would be more appropriate. 

Rough sketch: 

I added a grid square to help keep the images neat and in line. To keep the scale of the teapot the same in each square, I traced the outline for continuity purposes. 

Now for colour. Because I chose a vintage feel in terms of shape. I decided to work delicately with a little watercolour. I also wanted to add a really simple version of the original teapot floral design that I used as inspiration. 

As the exercise suggests that its best to not use words at all, I will leave it here and see how people respond to this drawing. 

Feedback from others: 

I showed this drawing to 3 people. All 3 could see that it was a guide to "making a cup of tea", this is a good thing! 

Reflection: 

I am very happy with my sketch and I enjoyed the thought and design process. 

It is at this point in time that I can see how the introduction of digital media or applications could really help me To date, all of my work has been created by hand. With editing, it would be interesting to see how this drawing would look with the addition of worded instructions. 

References: 

www. yorkshiretea.co.uk